The operator of Japan’s tsunami-hit nuclear plant says tons of highly radioactive water appears to have leaked into the ocean from a purification unit. The leak comes as Tokyo Electric Power Co. struggles to keep the melted reactors cool and contain radiation and raises concerns about its ability to keep the plant stable. Similar leaks have occurred several times since last year, and officials say they do not pose an immediate health threat.

Workers spotted the leak early Thursday coming from a section of hose on a device used to decontaminate cooling water leaking from reactors. The company said it appeared to have stopped the leak.

The government declared in December the plant had achieved stability and radiation leaks have significantly decreased.

Two scientists who found radiation in sea kelp along the Southern California coast after Japan’s 2011 tsunami-induced nuclear disaster now hope to study whether contamination may be present in fish such as opaleye and other ocean creatures, including lobster and sea urchin: here.

The nuclear industry has been responsible for some of the crudest racism in Australia’s history. This racism dates from the British nuclear bomb tests in the 1950s but it can still be seen today: here.

In the year-plus since the world’s worst nuclear accident in a quarter century, Japan has seen a run of dubious products aimed at detecting or alleviating radiation’s effects. In January, Japan’s nursery-school association issued a fraud alert on a company, Japan QRS Health Management Association, that claims it could measure a person’s internal radiation accumulation with a machine reading an electromagnetic aura from snips of the person’s hair.

That prompted Tokyo’s Bureau of Social Welfare and Public Health to open a probe.

A suit that supposedly makes the wearer sweat out radiation was flagged as suspect by the government last July. Japan’s consumer-watchdog agency also took note of bathtubs priced at $6,500 that purport to suck radiation out of bathers, among the items that led it to issue a report warning consumers. In Iwaki, about 25 miles south of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant where the accident occurred in March 2011, the emergency-response department says it has received a barrage of radiation-related pitches.

The vendors appear to be taking a profit from the public’s worries over radiation exposure in post-accident Japan, particularly in areas near the plant with contamination. Elevated levels of radiation are showing up in everything from beef and rice to fertilizer and concrete, causing anxious residents to ask how much is building up inside their own bodies and what the effects will be.The government has been slow to address the public’s concerns over radiation exposure, leading people to scramble for solutions on their own.

Radiation specialists say many of these antiradiation products are pure fiction. “Quackery, in a word,” says Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health researcher Norman Kleiman, on the claim that a machine can detect how much radiation has accumulated in someone’s body from a strand of hair.

But for worried consumers, many of whom know little about radiation or its effects, the range of goods is bewildering and the science underpinning them unclear. Some of the most anxious are the parents of young children, who experts say are the most vulnerable to the effects of radiation.

Around 10 members of a citizens’ group began a hunger strike Tuesday in front of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry to protest the government’s plan to restart two reactors at the Oi nuclear power plant in Fukui Prefecture. The group plans to continue the hunger strike, with members taking turns for a few days or a week, until May 5, when the No. 3 reactor at Hokkaido Electric Power Co.’s Tomari plant, the only commercial reactor in Japan still operating, is scheduled to be taken offline for maintenance and inspections.

In addition to the hunger strike, hundreds of people staged a rally in front of the METI building.

Among the participants were antinuclear journalist Satoshi Kamata and author Keiko Ochiai.

A nuclear plant in northwestern Japan may be sitting right on top of an active geological fault, the country’s nuclear watchdog has said, raising the risk that the facility may never resume power generation for fear of an earthquake.

For the first time in more than 40 years, Japan faces the prospect of having no nuclear power within weeks, after last year’s crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant crushed public trust in nuclear power and prevented the restart of reactors shut for regular maintenance checks.

The fault fracture zone under the No.1 and No.2 units of the 1,517-megawatt Tsuruga plant could be an active fault that could move jointly with a confirmed nearby active fault, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) found in a site survey on Tuesday, a spokesman for the plant’s operator said.

The operator, unlisted Japan Atomic Power Co, denies the existence of an active fault right under the plant, citing its geological assessment, but the NISA has ordered an additional investigation following its findings, the spokesman said.

JAPAN: The crippled Tokyo Electric Power Co is to receive 1 trillion yen (£7.8 billion) and accept temporary state control to help it cope with the aftermath of the tsunami which devastated the Fukushima nuclear plant

The steps were part of a restructuring plan approved by the government today.

In exchange, the company has appointed new management and pledged to cut costs and raise prices.

Japan planned to sign a contract with the United States next month for the purchase of four F-35 stealth fighter jets despite a price increase for the aircraft, local media reported Monday.

The fighter jets are set to be delivered before the end of fiscal year 2016 and may cost about 138 million U.S. dollars per unit. The Japanese government is making arrangements with the U.S. for the purchase as part of the budget in the current fiscal year which ends next March, Xinhua reported.

The Japanese government decided in December to choose the F-35 stealth jet, developed by the United States and eight other countries, as the country’s next-generation fighter jet.

The government originally estimated the price of the jet to be about 9.9 billion yen (about 123 million U.S. dollars) per aircraft. The price rose after the U.S. decided to postpone its purchase of the jets due to its defense budget cuts.

Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Lightning II stealth fighter, which had been reviewed along with Boeing’s FA-18 Super Hornet and the Eurofighter Typhoon, will replace the country’s 40-year-old fleet of F-4s.